Work Loss Institute Issues State Report Cards

Encinitas, Calif.-based Work Loss Data Institute (WLDI) released its 2012 State Report Cards for Workers’ Comp this week. The report, which is used to track trends and give states a grade and tier ranking based on their performance, now includes data from a 10-year period. Forty-three states are covered, plus Puerto Rico, Guam and the Virgin Islands.

WLDI, an independent database development company focused on workplace health and productivity, notes the following states’ trending information. Alabama, Arkansas, Michigan and Missouri all showed impressive advancement, while Texas wins “Most Improved,” with a dramatic move from four years of failing grades from 2000-2003, to a steady incline that peaked in 2008 and 2009 with grades of B-. If the state continues on this trend, Texas, which underwent a major workers’ compensation overhaul in 2007, could end up a leader in workers’ comp performance, notes WLDI.

Utah performed the best of all the states for 2009, and Arkansas and Minnesota came in a close second and third. All three states received a grade of A+ based on an average of their 2009 scores in the five categories above. West Virginia, New York, Hawaii, Wyoming and Kentucky received failing grades. This is New York’s tenth consecutive year with an F grade. A summary of each grade for all states is shown on a U.S. map showing grades by state, located here. 

In terms of the tier ranking system, the Tier I states are Arizona, Minnesota and Utah, which were also Tier I in the 2010 report, plus Virginia for 2012. Tier I means that the state had an average grade of “B+” or better, and a trend going up or level. Those four states are doing great and continuing to improve. Only two states fall into the opposite category—Tier VI—which means they had an average grade of “D-“ or worse, and a trend going down or level. Those states are Kentucky and New York. In the last report there were five states in the Tier VI category, so the change shows a national trend toward improving grades. A summary of tier rankings for all states is shown on a U.S. map showing grades by state, located here. 

WLDI’s State Report Cards are based on data from OSHA Forms 300 and 200, which cover all OSHA recordable injuries and illnesses and provide the basis for rating state-by-state workers’ compensation performance. The report cards help employers, insurers, TPA’s, state governments and consultants answer the questions, “Who is doing well and why?”

In addition to safety and severity, the State Report Cards emphasize the primary outcome measure—do workers get better and go back to work? Answering that question, should, over time, be congruent with the fastest-growing expense, which is medical costs, but the State Report Cards do not track actual medical costs, reports WLDI. Five different outcome measures are compared among the states for each year: (1) Incidence Rates, (2) Cases Missing Work, (3) Median Disability Durations, (4) Delayed Recovery Rate; and (5) Key Condition: Low Back Strain. An essential requirement for production of this report was the proprietary crosswalk program that has been developed by Work Loss Data Institute, which converts OSHA-reported data into an ICD9 code format. More details on the methodology used are located here. 

The last report was published in March of 2010, with data from 2000-2007. In the past, in an effort to seek more differentiation, secondary measures were used to break ties. Now, with 10 years of data, there is sufficient data over a long enough time frame to differentiate states adequately even while respecting ties on individual measures during any given year, says WLDI. Beginning with 2008 data, full weight is attributed to primary measures, even in the case of ties, which leads to an even more accurate assessment of each state’s performance.